Sidelineland

Continuing the theme of magnificent legs, I just watched Joey Angel take on Garrett Thomas over at Wrestler4Hire. Joey has caught my eye before, but I haven’t watched one of his matches from start to finish before now. The sparse color commentary and 3-D fan experience at W4H simply describes Joey as an “amateur bodybuilder with martial arts experience.” While both facts are self-evidently true, that doesn’t begin to describe what is equally as obvious, like he’s got to be over a half a foot shorter than Garrett Thomas, and he’s gorgeous as fuck, and those legs are nothing short of sensational!

There’s an oft repeated theme at W4H of the pro versus the poser. This match dabbles in that genre, with some sweet twists here and there. Garrett is the pro. He’s long and lean and rock and roll to Joey’s angelic, clean cut beauty. Garrett’s profile gives a few more details to inspire a fan’s fantasies. He’s 6’1″ and 205 pounds. He’s reportedly 28 years old and described as a “well-traveled pro wrestler looking to make a name in the underground scene.” Now there’s some drama that I love. There’s a little backstory to suck us in and make us ask questions. And I love knowing ages. I immediately picture myself at 28 and wonder what life would have been like in Garrett’s shoes. It will surprise no one who knows me that I love the details.

The match description signals to the novice Joey-fan that he is notoriously a babyface-to-slaughter in a singlet and a “fuck-you-up muscle god ready to conquer” out of his singlet. Again, I love the nuanced device. I love the homage to the way that wrestling gear sets the table for us. And I particularly love it when, in his pre-match warm up, Joey shrugs those gargantuan shoulders out of the babyface singlet straps and starts flexing for the camera with a little passion behind it. Based on the trajectory of my loving thus far, it should come as no surprise that I’m ready to propose marriage when Joey is celebrating a nice run of having his way, muscle bullying the shocked pro, and about 2 minutes into the match he steps back, bends over, and peels the singlet off his mammoth thighs. “Woah!” Garrett says in surprise. “You came here to party! Now that’s what I like to see, man,” he marvels unironically. “Those are shorter than mine!” he says with just a bit of enthusiasm. Honestly, I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a pair of super briefs as perfectly fitted and aesthetically ideal for a body. Joey scores points for wearing them to perfection, and Garrett scores a point for channeling his gay wrestling fan within.

Garrett is also obviously familiar with the pro versus poser motif. He quickly dismisses Joey’s cage fighting expertise and offers to show him a few pro wrestling moves to up his W4H game. He towers over the pint sized muscle stud, expertly utilizing leverage and muscle memory to work Joey’s fine, fine ass into vulnerable positions. He’s clearly putting on the harsh, unforgiving coach’s hat and calmly demonstrating his mastery, hoisting Joey way, way off his feet in a butt-beautiful bearhug. He rolls him into a camel clutch, describing the hold along the way for the ring rookie. He exploits some advantage to snag Joey’s ankles, hook them beneath his armpits, and squat low, explaining, “Now we’re going to go to the main street of Boston!” Thing is, though, this poser’s got muscle and moves. He spins and kicks free. He scrambles headfirst into the fray fearlessly, and about 4 times out of 5, he comes out of the full throttle scrambles on top, in charge, and instantly owning a seriously jeopardizing joint hold.

“Woah!” Garrett gasps with shock when Joey systematically neutralizes the pro’s offense and muscles his way into the driver’s seat. An exquisitely vulnerable arm bar from Joey makes the pro’s long, baby oiled body suddenly go rigid, not daring to move too far for fear of helping his opponent actually cripple him. “I’m going to break it,” Joey says. Calmly. Like an objective observation, more than a threat. “No, no, no, no!” Garrett absolutely begs, holding up his open free hand pleadingly, living into the terror of this moment of another man possessing the very real power of putting him in the hospital.

Joey lets him go.  I’m not sure if there was an actual submission. There could have been. There are a lot of unintelligible grunts and random tapping of the mat here and there, sometimes seemingly as signals for breaking holds. Nobody’s counting, either way. “Listen man,” the pro says pleadingly on his knees, having been granted the largesse of his muscle-tastic opponent. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t know you were going to be this good.” It’s pro crow eating time. I believe him, frankly. This turns out to be no pro versus poser contempt fest. Joey may be green, but he’s the real deal, and I believe him, and I believe Garrett’s grudging respect. Still on one knee (and therefore, nearly eye to eye with the gorgeous muscle kid standing in front of him), the pro extends a hand.  Joey looks suspicious (see, not a complete poser!). Shockingly, Joey bats the hand away and lifts a heel to pound into Garrett’s baby oiled chest. Great instincts, Joey. Just a half second too slow, though. Garrett swings a nasty fist into Joey’s balls, like he’s clearly been planning all along.

“Ain’t got no balls of steel, huh?” Garrett taunts, climbing back into the saddle and riding this thoroughbred like the pro he is. He continues the initiation theme. “I was just trying to be friends,” he says disarmingly enough. “You really ought to invest in a pair of boots, though,” he thoughtfully offers unsolicited advice. “Because people can do THIS!” He stomps the heel of his boot down into the top of one of Joey’s bare feet. The magnificent muscle gladiator drops to the mat, clutching his foot. “And also, when you don’t wear boots, what else people can do is take your little piggies to the market.” Garrett sadistically toys with a toe hold, playing with each of Joey’s toes until he abruptly attempts to rip his little toe off his foot. “How’s that feel, brother? Let’s see you walk now, huh?”

I don’t know if this is really a match that will help Garrett make a name for himself in the underground scene. The other legit pros that Cameron Matthews recruits are surely docking Garrett’s cred for letting a muscle kid with next to no ring experience take him to the edge and back. When Joey is punching the accelerator, there’s nearly a script flip, with Garrett almost looking like the poser getting taken to school. Joey uses all of that incredibly juicy muscle to hoist the 28 year old off his feet into a breathtaking bearhug. He shows that he already knew full well what that full nelson was all about when Garrett was condescendingly explaining the hold to him earlier. “On your knees!” Joey growls. Fuck, who would NOT obey that command, that muscle, that force of will!?

Then, with astonishing certainty and deliberateness, gorgeous little muscle beast Joey locks the pro up in a magnificent, oil-rubbed, glistening abdominal stretch. “Where…where did you learn this!?” Garrett asks in open shock, grimacing with pain. “I took a few wrestling classes,” Joey replies coyly, before flinging the long haired bad ass to the mat in a heap and treating you and me to a truly delightful posing session, demonstrating each and every lovingly crafted, aesthetically marvelous, magnificently powerful muscle that just brought a 6’1″ pro heel to his knees with a whimper.

Other bloggers are much, much more respectful of avoiding spoilers than I am, but in this case, I’ll leave you in suspense as to how this pro/poser versus pro/poser teeter totter turns out. I, for one, love the self-critical play on the motif. I enjoy precisely that suspense, sold with surprising clarity by both battlers, that has me honestly not knowing until the very, very end which abundantly skilled combatant will finally bring this to a climactic ending with an out-cold dragon sleeper finisher. I appreciate the respect for underground wrestling and for fans that Garrett shows us, channeling his inner Joey Lawrence by repeatedly gasping, “woah!” with sweet sincerity when he finds himself honest to god at the MMAer’s mercy. And I now have a huge fan crush on Joey Angel for being nobody’s poser, for fucking going to town on a much taller, much more experienced pro and making me believe every last second.

Oh, and those legs. Those fucking sensational, power packed, monstrously massive, muscle worship-ready legs. I fucking love those things.

New releases last month included several surprises, not all of them good, mind you. My policy for several years has been about accentuating the positive, rather than harping on what I don’t like, though. That’s why I routinely don’t approve comments from readers that cross the line from constructive critique and comparison to personal attacks, body shaming, or just plain nastiness. It isn’t that I like everything I see. I just don’t want this blog to be a bitch session like 95% of every other inch of the internet. So whatever didn’t hit its mark last month, I want to focus in on a particular wrestler who did. For turning my crank, making me sit up an take new notice, and getting me off in a way I honestly was not expecting, the new homoerotic wrestler of the month around these parts is…

…Richie Douglas.

I was a Richie fan from the moment I first saw him debut a couple of years ago. He has a virginal quality. It’s that ephemeral vibe that a doe-eyed, dimpled chin man-boy can possess that gets us talking about him as a “boy next door.”  Not that my next door neighbors have ever looked like this babyface beauty.  Richie is more the boy I grew up wanting to live next door, and wanting to be best buddies with him, and wanting him to be as wrestling curious as I was.

Richie’s Sunshine Shooters 8 match against Goren Ford fired on all cylinders for so many reasons that I’ve mentioned before. There’s a daddy/boy element to the pairing that’s phenomenal. I actually have no idea what the actual age difference may be, but Goren presents as a magnificently masculine baritone to Richie’s more delicate second tenor. Richie is 5 inches shorter and a good 30 pounds lighter, which regularly draws out 3 dimensional contrasts in the interactions between them. When Goren is towering over him and muscle bullying our boy next door, there’s a super sexy daddy’s home appeal that harkens back to Goren’s scorching hot Dark Knights 12 debut. But when Richie is shocking daddy to his knees, leveraging his lighter frame and calm, calculating skills to make this grown man weep, the daddy bashing is like an intoxicatingly delicious vintage made just that much more thrilling for how rarely it’s ever been bottled.

But Richie stands out in the match in no small part for turning a corner. I knew Goren was into brutal, erotic wrestling foreplay, but I was honestly just a little shocked when the big man is appraisingly squeezing Richie’s lush left pec, and our virginal boy next door just leaves his arms hanging at his sides and smiles up at him. It’s no nohomo machismo shit. It isn’t that he’s somehow failing to read the signals here, somehow missing Goren’s obvious interest in dialing this match up to fuck stakes. “So you like shoving your balls in a man’s face, huh?” Goren asks, calling out the boy next door for exacting a humiliating submission with his balls smothering Goren in a schoolboy pin. “You like that?” Goren demands that Richie say with his mouth what he’s been screaming with his sweat soaked golden body for the last 15 minutes. “Maybe,” Richie smiles brightly, taunting the big man with just a teasing hint of what he wants.

Goren drops to his knees and peels the soaked singlet off of his shockingly game opponent. He strokes Richie’s torso. He reaches out and almost lovingly cups Richie’s balls like a promise to be an attentive lover. “You like that kind of shit?” Goren coos, leaning in, towering over him, seducing him into making this Richie’s breakout debut in the unambiguously erotic ranks of homoerotic wrestling. “Maybe,” Richie replies, his eyes locked onto Goren’s gorgeous face, reading the carnal intent written at the twitching corners of his mouth. “I think you do kind of like that,” Goren posits, reeling this boy next door in another half an inch to shore. “So what if I do?” Richie asks rhetorically, his gaze unflinching, his hands relaxed at his sides as he permits the big man to fondle his hefty package.

“I wonder what else you like,” Goren muses, reaching around hand grabbing a huge handful of Richie’s sweet ass cheek. And then right here, right at this moment, Richie doesn’t just make the decisive move that makes me anoint him HWOTM. He sums up what I think is the heart and soul of homoerotic wrestling when he lays down the sexiest, sweetest, most raw and real challenge that I’m always longing to be at the heart of my favorite wrestling. “Why don’t you find out?”

It makes sense that Goren continues to be the sexual aggressor for the remainder of the match, for the most part. While lovely Richie does persist in shoving his ample package in Goren’s face repeatedly, it’s Goren who ups the ante by sticking out his tongue and hungrily licking up and down Richie’s inner thigh before opening wide and massaging his balls inside his mouth. It’s Goren who mounts the kid’s ass and breathlessly flexes his glutes, grinding his crotch into Richie’s virginal ass. This is familiar territory for the muscled Dark Knight, while, at least on camera, this is all new territory for little Richie.

But what I love so much is that Richie lets him do it. He’s fucking fearless, not just in accepting this catchweight challenge, but in not even blinking when the content and implied stakes abruptly veer into unvarnished lust. It could have turned fumbling and embarrassed. He could have, understandably, let show at least a little fear that Goren’s beautiful, thick cock was aching for his sweet little ass. But he doesn’t, and in fact he drives big daddy to complete distraction and, with a mature, steady hand, absolutely rips Goren apart when he’s gagging for it and vulnerable.

I was totally thinking that little Richie was in over his head, but it’s clearly the other way around. He makes Goren pay hard for wanting so much to be the first to plant his flag in unclaimed territory.  Richie could easily cripple the screaming, wailing, writhing, completely shocked daddy. He nearly does. Goren has been his own undoing.

In a last gasp of concentration on victory, Goren nearly gets the decisive, final fall with a vicious, vengeful single leg crab. Richie kicks free, just barely. He’s on his back, with big daddy already climbing on top of him, sliding into place to return the favor for all of his ball-gag schoolboy pin smotherings. He can taste victory, or, more like, he can already see in his mind’s eye little Richie gagging on defeat shoved down his throat. But Richie agilely slides back and snaps his gorgeous thighs around Goren’s ears.  He reaches down and grabs the back of his opponent’s head, pulling hard, entirely blocking both nose and throat from breathing in oxygen for the big, mouthwatering bulge grinding into his face. And then Richie leans back, smiling a huge, toothy, adorably ear-to-ear smile, knowing that his time has come. His eye lids flutter just a bit. His jaw loosens as he feels Goren start to go limp, buried in his crotch. “Oh, yeah!” Richie gasps, feeling deep down in his core the joy of his first victory in the unambiguously erotic end of the gay wrestling pool.

Richie’s parting shot seals the deal for me. “See you in the showers!” he barks. In a different tone, it could have come across as “this was all water under the bridge.” It could have been a nohomo moment itself, walking away from the openly erotic text and signaling that they’ll never talk of this again once they leave this room. But Richie’s inflection is just right to communicate that the erotic content is far from over. All of those “maybes” from earlier are about to be amended into full on “fuck, yeses.” Someone’s sweet ass is still in the cross hairs. It just isn’t the boy next door’s ass. “Oh, MAN!” Goren gasps as he tries to clear his head. And again, there’s something metaphorical about the text. Richie Douglas may look like the boy next door, but just ask Goren and he’ll tell you: Richie is all man.

And not only is Richie all man. He’s also my reigning Homoerotic Wrestler of the Month.

Not long ago I moved to a part of the country where, on bright, sunny summer weekends, I frequently see hand drawn yard signs advertising “Tag Sale.” I’d never heard this term before, but I’ve since learned it is equivalent to what I grew up calling a “Garage Sale,” (yard sale, rummage sale, etc., etc.). Apparently around here, when you’ve accumulated more stuff than you honestly have room to keep, you slap a price tag on it and call it a tag sale.

Along those lines, Ty Alexander recently told me that he has decided he simply has to do a serious culling of his notoriously massive wrestling gear collection. The Trophy Boy has been dishing out fashion advice and cataloging every piece of ass-hugging gear he can get his hands on since he was out of diapers. I have it on very, very good authority that Ty’s gear collection has a bedroom all to itself. So just imagine what it must mean that he’s run out of room and now needing to pare down in order to keep purchasing more.

So here’s your chance to do Ty a solid and score some Ty-approved gear to start your own collection with (it’s kind of like a sourdough starter). I’ve seen on Facebook that he’s trying to organize this superhuman undertaking by starting with singlets. Presumably, he will move on to his mammoth collection of square cuts, designer briefs, and jock straps. I don’t know if his personalized Trophy Boy copyrighted trunks and wristbands will be tagged. I’m pretty sure not everything you can see him wearing in the photos I’ve included in this post will be available (I’m just enjoying the excuse to post some of my favorite Ty fashions modeled by the Trophy Boy himself).

However, I will go out on a limb and say that I’d bet Ty would be willing to sell them laundered or not. For those Ty-Heads out there, I’d bet he’d even be willing to work up a sweat in them before packaging them up for you. If I were you, I’d ask for a photo of him wearing them to accompany your fashion purchase to verify that they have, indeed, housed his beautiful bubble butt. I cannot verify if that would cost you extra. Ask for the Bard discount.

In any case, contact the Trophy Boy directly about what may be on your holiday wish list by messaging him on Facebook or emailing him at Tyzander305@gmail.com.

Context, please.  Backstory. Character motivation. Story arc. One through line across my years of blogging has been harping on “the story” in homoerotic wrestling. I know I’m not alone. The publicly released custom bouts several companies have produced frequently hinge on more than just two hot bodies. They’re filled with gimmicks and plot twists and grudges and appeals to specific kinks, suggesting to me that I’m definitely not the only one that wants something more narrative than just two guys pro wrestling. It’s one thing to film two hot bodied athletes delivering pro wrestling moves in an otherwise empty garage. It’s something else, and something much more compelling, to tell a story with it. When there just isn’t any context, the burden is on us, the consumer, to make sense of why two pretty boys would go through the motions of acting out what would, in real life, be potentially crippling offensive maneuvers on each other.

I’ve written some match descriptions for marketing homoerotic wrestling. I’ve taken the liberty at times to narrate something that didn’t make it on camera. I’ve never tried to mislead potential consumers. My sincerest goal is never to imply anything that isn’t evident or abundantly implied in the match. I just amplify, fill in details, speak to intrinsic motivations that are entirely consistent with, if not explicitly spelled out, in the video document. I watch about 10 times more matches for my personal entertainment than what I write for publishing as marketing material, and sometimes – a lot of times – I wonder to myself, but why is this happening?

I settled in just this morning to appreciate two of my recent crushes, Zach Reno and Alex Oliver, mixing it up for Cameron Matthew’s Wrestler4Hire. The match description should have been a warning to me. “When Alex Oliver ties up with Zach Reno, there are no pretenses. No claims of superiority. No nonsense. Just two ripped and rambunctious rasslers doing what they do best.” In other words, no context.

On this blank slate of Alex and Zach going head to head in the ring is a sensational wrestling clinic put on by hot, hairy, entirely dominant Zach.  On the topic of differentials, Zach stands a full half a foot shorter than baby smooth hunk Alex, and the little guy rips him apart from start to finish. Zach terrorizes him. It’s one long uncut take, which is a sensational novelty in this business in and of itself. And Zach kicks Alex’ marvelous ass every fucking which way and loose for 20 minutes.

I’m into it, mind you. About 7 minutes in, Zach breaks his awkward silence and generously offers, “I can kick your ass some more, or we can call it even.” But, wait… what?  Call it even?  Call what even? What’s the context here?  Why did they start this match? Why is Zach offering to walk away and “call it even?”  What did Alex owe him that 7 minutes of totally humiliating corporal punishment makes “even?”  Wait. What?

“Fuck you,” Alex spits back. Huh?  I mean, maybe he’s bitter for getting completely schooled by a hot little pro a half a foot shorter. Maybe? Maybe he’s snarling obscenities at his opponent (from flat on his back, gasping for air, and choke/weeping from his 6th or 20th submission he’s just given away) because Zach called him a pro wrestling wannabe pussy about 5 minutes before they charged into the ring to settle whether Alex is just a pretty pretender. But, wait, no, the match description says there’s no pretense. No context.

This match still gets me off. The warm up act is Alex Oliver’s ass. I’ve made considerable hay about Alex’ infinitely fuckable ass before. Now more than ever I’m promoting the hashtag #AlexOliversAssForPresident. His whole body is a work of art, of course. His meaty thighs, incredibly narrow waist, ripped abs, gorgeous, bulging shoulders. Someone who appreciates Alex’ aesthetics even half as much as I do has GOT to wrestle this stud, because I would donate a kidney to watch an opponent take him on for the sheer erotic thrill of possessing that body and planting a flagpole between those fantastic cheeks. But, that would be character motivation. That would be pretense.

Zach is pretty fucking amazing to watch working his craft like a master, but his bare handed chokes punch some buttons in me hard. I’ve been fixated on bare handed chokes for exactly two weeks now. Watching him throttle a ripped hunk a half a foot taller is damn compelling all on its own. He doesn’t need to get that nasty, of course. His bodyscissors, headscissors, Boston crab, camel clutch, abdominal stretch, full nelson, OTK backbreaker, dragon sleeper, and abdominal claw have, each and every one, pried weeping, choking submissions out of Alex. There’s no real reason for him to need to threaten to actual strangle this kid, but he does, and I’d love to know what drives Zach in that moment to be dissatisfied with completely owning Alex and so suddenly raging into bare handed strangulation. But that would be pretense.

I’m picking on Wrestler4Hire now. But I do want to point out what’s missing before I finish by clarifying that this match gets me off. When Zach suddenly wipes the very real sweat off his brow (remember, no cuts, so that’s real sweat) and then flings it in Alex’ face, sweet fuck, that’s sexy. When Alex screams “You’re going to rip me in half!,” there’s something incredibly erotic about the genuine sound of panic in his voice. Zach is a bottle of ultra concentrated bad ass, and Alex is a barefoot, babyface hero who calls to mind the likes of a young Kevin Von Erich. And like Kevin, Alex has that headliner ass that someday, somehow, under one pretense or another, we have GOT to see laid bare.

I’ve let a little distance grow between me and Thunder’s Arena lately. It’s not about the wrestling. It’s the business side of things. Thunder’s appears to have done an upgrade and relaunch of their membership site in the last year, but I kept getting billed for the defunct membership site that stopped getting updates months ago. For the most part, I sign up for membership sites for the photos to use in reviews here at neverland. So getting caught in an expensive new-and-improved loop of obsolescence left a vaguely bad taste in my mouth, and I just haven’t been paying attention to Thunder’s for a while as a result. The exact same thing happened to my relationship with Can-Am a while back.

I don’t know if Mr. Mike noticed the drift, but I unexpectedly received some gifts from Thunder’s a couple of weeks ago. It’s not like I’m NOT going to watch a couple of sensationally sexy looking hunks in minuscule gear throw each other around. And truth be told, reading Joe’s reviews of relative newcomer Scrappy has, indeed, left me wanting to sample his goods. So I sat down an opened my first and earliest Christmas present this year: Halloween Havoc 2016 – Scrappy vs. Santiago.

Scrappy takes the initiative first, hoisting a flat footed Santiago up into a standing full nelson. The effect is stunning and sets an expansive table for what we’re supposed to see in this match. Santagio, stretched out and flung from side to side, is magnificent to watch. He’s delicious, all tanned, tatted, high and tight with a closely cropped beard. There’s something about his blue briefs that give me a nostalgic hit of my youth. They remind me strongly of the first time I got naked with another man, he in his height of fashion Calvin Kleins. Like that that hot, sexy, fumbling young beauty from way back, Santiago’s cotton briefs are tight, but not suction packed. They hug his bulges without squeezing. They scream 80’s gay hook up to me in that way that turns me on with just the gentlest note of melancholy for brighter days. When Scrappy leans way back and lifts Santiago off his feet, the camera centered like a laser beam on Santiago’s bouncing crotch, I’m already fully engaged, identifying with Scrappy, and feeling that passionate excitement about the promise of getting to see and feel another man’s cock.

The match is a mix of intensity and lack of focus. On the one hand, these boys work up a legitimate sweat. They are lifting and slamming each other, audibly pounding the air out of each other’s lungs in that way you just can’t quite fake. It’s a lot of catch and release, but the catches are held long and linger beautifully on the fully flexed, gritted teeth edge of muscle matching muscle. But, as I’ve said, it is catch and release. There isn’t a clear end in sight. The lack of context and the relatively lackadaisical approach to focusing with any particular interest on pins or submissions makes this feel just a little more like a photo shoot than a wrestling match at times. Scrappy and Santiago do a sensational job of generously framing each other’s gorgeous, hot bodies for the camera. But I’m not always certain what the fuck Santiago is doing there, in particular, other than looking so, so, so pretty.

What heat is generated is repeatedly sparked to life by Scrappy. He has that alluring quality of standing next to a man who is, arguably, more classically pretty, more symmetrical, taller, longer, harder, but that sparkle in Scrappy’s eyes and that eager, expansive grin across his face make poor Santiago blur into the background. Whereas Santiago is oddly quiet, Scrappy narrates on occasion like the cocky top dog. “Try to get out of there,” he taunts, squeezing his opponent’s hips between his pale, powerful thighs. “You can’t get out,” he smirks.

Santiago occasionally rises to the occasion, however. He does, indeed, muscle his way out of those scissors, and suddenly it’s his turn to show off Scrappy’s hot body like the prize calf at the county fair. He squeezes the boy wonder’s body between his dark thighs, flexing and growling, leaning in a stroking, kneading Scrappy’s marquee pecs.

Occasionally I get the impression that these boys genuinely enjoy each other’s bodies, for which I’m incredibly turned on. Scrappy does latch on some nasty pec claws late in the game, but most of the match, both of them afford more a “fondling” attention to each other’s chests. There’s a faint hit of what could have been muscle worship here and there, with each stud taking turns cupping and caressing each other’s bulging pecs. Particularly Scrappy seems to be silently exploiting the intimacy. When he’s staring up at a crowing, flexing, humiliating schoolboy pin underneath his opponent, Scrappy just reaches up and drags the palms of his hands up and down the deep crevices etched in Santiago’s ripped torso. When he’s back in the driver’s seat, late in the game, Scrappy latches on a deep, grinding chokehold with one hand and delicately cups his free hand across the bulging mountain of Santiago’s right pec. There’s no strategic advantage. It’s something less than explicitly erotic. But it’s crazy provocative and somehow almost tender, which instantly skyrockets the homoeroticism for me.

A few other catch and release holds stand out. Santiago’s cock pillow headscissors are intensely intimate. It’s not just the super close up camera angle peering down the ridged length of Santiago’s torso to get his view of his opponent’s head trapped helplessly between his inner thighs. More than that, it’s Santiago grabbing Scrapper by the chin and pulling back, while thrusting his hips forward, crushing his cock against the back of Scrappy’s head. If, on release, we’d seen Santiago’s erect cock head stretched and staining those now sagging cotton briefs, I’d be ready to nominate him a shocking HWOTM. But, alas.

On Santiago’s side of the equation, I also get a little overheated when he quite literally takes his left hand and slams Scrappy to the mat by his throat. It’s violent. It’s a straightforward throttling. There’s a slight hit of angry frustration in it, demonstrating that he could, if pressed, dive headlong into seriously high jeopardy street fighting. But it’s just a hint. Catch and release.

But the marquee player here is Scrappy. His series of bearhug variations probably are intended to show off Santiago’s gorgeous physique, which they do, but Scrappy fucking sells it like a mother fucker. “You think you’re stronger than me!?” he demands mid bearhug at one point, pissed at his opponent using sheer muscle to power his way out of the last hold. “I don’t think so!” Scrappy crows, and no shit, his arms flex huge as he hoists the pretty boy off his feet and shakes him like a rag doll. I bet Santiago did think he was stronger than Scrappy. And, no shit, Scrappy disproves that misperception commandingly.

Before the match is half over, this is all about Scrappy for me. After gut wrenching the bigger man upside down and slamming Santiago’s head into the mat repeatedly, Scrappy returns the favor from earlier by flashing his magnificently peaked biceps in the stunned stud’s face. When Santiago drags himself up to his hands and knees, Scrappy slaps that ass hard, laughing. “You best stay down,” he taunts with a rural, mid-South twang. “I don’t know if you can handle it,” he smirks, even as he’s absent-mindedly, excitedly grabbing his cock through his briefs and tugging hard.

In the end, this match satisfies on the weight of two last pieces of evidence. One, Santiago grabs Scrappy’s ass on a couple of occasions. Now, I’m not talking about incidental contact. This isn’t grabbing a strategic handhold in order to lift and carry, for example. No, for no other apparent reason than Scrappy’s ass is just that fucking sensational, Santiago digs his fingers into this kid’s lush left cheek and just holds that magnificent muscle for a second. Fuck, yes, that needed to happen.

And finally, out of nowhere, Scrappy sleepers the pretty boy out cold. It wasn’t always particularly competitive, but watching Scrappy’s adorable face morph into the biggest, toothiest, proudest sexy smile I’ve seen in a long time, I rewrite the entire 20 minutes to be, in retrospect, about bragging rights and victory. His mouth hangs open in delight, flexing, staring into the camera as he crows. “Scrappy got a win today, boys! Scrappy got a ‘W’!”  And for acknowledging us “boys” watching, and for referring to himself in the 3rd person, and for making me believe that he’s genuinely pleased to score a victory, I’m both rewinding to watch some favorite moments again, and convinced that I am a big, big Scrappy fan.